How to Calculate Scrap Gold Value

If you're hoping to sell scrap gold in the form of gold fillings, gold jewelry, a gold tooth, or gold extracted from an electronic device to a scrap gold buyer, then you may want to calculate scrap gold value to figure out how much you should be selling for. You can figure out the value of scrap gold using an online calculator or do the calculation manually.

Find today's gold value

Find scrap gold prices per gram by calculating it from today's gold price. Determine the current price of gold at any website that tracks the gold market. The price of gold fluctuates daily and is measured in troy ounces, or about 31 grams.

Divide the price of gold dollar amount by 31.1035 grams and round off to the nearest cent. For example, if on a given day the current price of gold is $1000 per troy ounce, then the price per gram equals 1200 divided by 31.1035, or $38.58.

Sorting and weighting your scrap gold

To find out your scrap gold value, sort it and then weigh it. Divide the scrap gold into categories according to 10K (karat), 14K, 24K, etc. Note the fineness using a magnifying glass if necessary. Don't include any items that are gold-plated in your pile of gold scrap.

Use a gram scale to weigh the gold. Or, if you have a lot of gold scrap, weigh the gold on a scale that accurately weighs ounces and convert ounces to grams. If you have 1 ounce of gold, you have about 28 grams of gold.

Calculating scrap gold value

Multiply as follows to calculate the scrap gold value sorted by karats:

• for 10 karat (10K) gold, multiply the day's price of gold per gram (the number you got in Step 2) by .4167.
• for 14 karat (14K) gold, multiply the gold price per gram by .5833.
• for 18 karat (18K) gold, multiply the current price of gold by .75
• for 24 karat (24K) gold, simply use the price of gold per gram.

If you have a different karat weight, simply divide the karat by 24 to get the decimal to use.

Multiply the number you got from the previous step times the number of grams of the gold fineness you're pricing. That is the current price of gold scrap on the market. Be aware that when selling gold scrap to scrap gold dealers, you may get from 10 to 50 percent less than the market value. Part of it depends on how much scrap gold you sell.